Amicus Briefs with Which the Court Has Been Showered

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Amicus Briefs with Which the Court Has Been Showered NO. 19-7 In The Supreme Court of the United States _________ SEILA LAW LLC, Petitioner, v. CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU, Respondent. ________________________ On Writ of Certiorari To the United States Court of Appeals For the Ninth Circuit _________________________ BRIEF OF AMICI CURIAE U.S. SENATORS SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, AND MAZIE HIRONO IN SUPPORT OF COURT-APPOINTED AMICUS CURIAE STEPHEN D. SUSMAN Counsel of Record AMANDA BONN RAKIM H.D. BROOKS SUSMAN GODFREY L.L.P. 1301 SIXTH AVENUE, 32ND FLOOR NEW YORK, NY 10019-6023 [email protected] [email protected] Counsel for Amici Curiae JANUARY 22, 2020 i TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF AUTHORITIES ....................................... ii INTEREST OF AMICI CURIAE ................................ 1 SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT .................................... 1 ARGUMENT ............................................................... 2 I. Congress Sought To Immunize The CFPB From The Very Influences That Now Seek To Undermine Nearly A Century Of Administrative Law. ..................... 2 II. This Challenge Is The Product Of A Long-Term Effort By Regulated Industries To Hobble Independent Agencies. ......................................................... 12 CONCLUSION .......................................................... 23 APPENDIX A ............................................................ 1a ii TABLE OF AUTHORITIES Page(s) Cases Bowsher v. Synar 478 U.S. 714 (1986) ............................................. 14 Citizens United v. Fed. Election Comm’n, 558 U.S. 310 (2010) ............................................... 3 Franchise Tax Bd. v. Hyatt, 139 S. Ct. 1485 (2019) ......................................... 20 Janus v. Am. Fed’n of State, Cty., & Mun. Emps., 138 S.Ct. 2448 (2018) .................................... 19, 20 John Doe No. 1 v. Reed, 561 U.S. 186 (2010) ............................................... 9 Lamb’s Chapel v. Center Moriches Union Free School Dist., 508 U.S. 384 (1993) ............................................. 20 Marshall v. Baltimore & Ohio R.R. Co., 57 U.S. 314 (1853) ................................................. 8 McCutcheon v. Fed. Elec. Comm’n, 572 U.S. 185 (2014) ............................................... 9 Myers v. United States, 272 U.S. 52 (1926) ................................................. 7 iii PHH Corp. v. C.F.P.B., 881 F.3d 75 (D.C. Cir. 2018) ........................... 6, 10 Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey v. Lee, 221 U.S. 1 (1901) ................................................... 6 Case Materials Brief of Amici Curiae CFPB Separation of Powers Scholars, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau v. All American Check Cashing, Inc., No. 18-60302 (5th Cir. 2018) ................................. 7 Tr. of Oral Arg., Bowsher v. Synar, 478 U.S. 714 (1986) (No. 85-1377) ............................................ 14 Statutes H.J. Res. 111, Pub. L. No. 115-74, 123 Stat. 1243 (2017) ................................................... 9 S.J. Res. 57 Pub. L. No. 115-73, 132 Stat. 1290 (May 21, 2018) ..................................... 9 72 Stat. 415 (codified at 28 U.S.C. § 1332(c)) ................................................................... 8 Rules Supreme Court Rule 37.6 ............................... 1, 16, 19 Treatises 2 AM. Jur. 2d Admin. Law § 384 (2019) .................. 10 iv Articles Robert Barnes & Steven Mufson, White House Counts on Kavanaugh in Battle Against ‘Administrative State’, WASH. POST (Aug. 12, 2018). ................ 9, 18 Mary Bottari, Behind Janus: Documents Reveal Decade-Long Plot to Kill Public- Sector Unions, IN THESE TIMES (Feb. 22, 2019) ............................................................... 19 William W. Buzbee et. al., Independent Agencies: How Independent is Too Independent? The Federalist Soc’y Nat’l Lawyers’ Convention (Nov. 2018) ...................................... 17 Zechariah Chafee, Jr., Freedom of Speech in War Time, 32 HARV. L. REV. 932 (1919) ................................ 11 Eamonn K. Moran, Wall Street Meets Main Street: Understanding the Financial Crisis, 13 N. C. BANKING INST. 5 (2009) .......................... 22 Brianne Gorod, Symposium: Why Kisor Is a Case to Watch, SCOTUS BLOG (Jan. 31, 2019).............................. 4 v Luke Hartig, Trump’s Four-Pronged War on the Administrative State, JUST SECURITY (Feb. 7, 2018) .............................. 12 Richard L. Hasen, The Decade of Citizens United, SLATE (Dec. 19, 2019) ....................................................... 3 Amanda Hollis-Brusky, Helping Ideas Have Consequences: Political and Intellectual Investment in the Unitary Executive Theory, 1981-2000, 89 DENV. U. L. REV. 197 (2011) ........................... 13 Gillian E. Metzger, Foreword: 1930s Redux: The Administrative State Under Siege, 131 HARV. L. REV. 1 (2017) .................................. 22 Frank Newport, Americans Want Government to Do More on Environment, GALLUP NEWS (Mar. 29, 2018) .............................. 3 Robert O’Harrow Jr. & Shawn Boburg, A Conservative Activist’s Behind-the- Scenes Campaign to Remake the Nation’s Courts, WASH. POST (May 21, 2019) ................................ 16 vi Lucinda Shen, Donald Trump is Targeting an Agency That Has Recovered $11.8 Billion for Consumers, FORTUNE (Jan. 27, 2017) ....................................... 4 Laurence Silberman, Panel I: Agency Autonomy and the Unitary Executive, 68 WASH. U.L.Q. 495 (1990) ................................ 16 Ann Southworth, Lawyers and the Conservative Counterrevolution, 43 LAW & SOC. INQUIRY 1698 (2018) ................... 15 Cass R. Sunstein & Adrian Vermuele, The Unbearable Rightness of Auer, 84 UNIV. CHI. L. REV. 297 (2016) ........................... 3 Cass R. Sunstein, Myth of the Unitary Executive, The Docket: Proceedings from the Administrative Conference of the United States, 7 ADMIN. L. REV. 299 (1993) .................................. 7 Mark Joseph Stern, What the Koch Brothers’ Money Buys, SLATE (May 2, 2018) .................................. 12 Jason Zengerle, How the Trump Administration is Remaking the Courts, N.Y. TIMES (Aug. 22, 2018) ..................... 18 vii Books JEFFERSON DECKER, THE OTHER RIGHTS REVOLUTION: CONSERVATIVE LAWYERS AND THE REMAKING OF AMERICAN GOVERNMENT (2016) ............................................ 13 CHARLES FRIED, ORDER AND LAW: ARGUING THE REAGAN REVOLUTION—A FIRSTHAND ACCOUNT (1991) ................................................... 13 BRINK LINDSEY & STEVEN M. TELES, THE CAPTURED ECONOMY: HOW THE POWERFUL ENRICH THEMSELVES, SLOW DOWN GROWTH, AND INCREASE INEQUALITY (2017) ................................................. 5 JANE MAYER, DARK MONEY: THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF THE BILLIONAIRES BEHIND THE RISE OF THE RADICAL RIGHT (2016) .......................................................... 5 NANCY MACLEAN, DEMOCRACY IN CHAINS (2017) ............................. 15 SHAWN OTTO, THE WAR ON SCIENCE (Milkweed Eds. 2016) .......................................... 11 Reports CONGRESSIONAL RESEARCH SERVICE, CONGRESS’S AUTHORITY TO INFLUENCE AND CONTROL EXECUTIVE BRANCH AGENCIES (Dec. 19, 2018) ...................... 10 viii CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU, THE OFFICE OF SERVICEMEMBER AFFAIRS: CHARTING OUR COURSE THROUGH THE MILITARY LIFECYCLE (May 2017) ............................................................. 5 FIN. CRISIS INQUIRY COMM’N, THE FINANCIAL CRISIS INQUIRY REPORT: FINAL REPORT OF THE NATIONAL COMMISSION ON THE CAUSES OF THE FINANCIAL AND ECONOMIC CRISIS IN THE UNITED STATES (2011)......................................................... 6 2017 Annual Report, The Federalist Soc’y for L. & Pub. Policy Studies, (Jan. 21, 2020 4:30 PM), https://fedsoc.org/commentary/public ations/annual-report-2017 .................................. 2a 2018 Annual Report, Sarah Scaife Foundation (Jan. 21, 2020 4:55 PM), http://www.scaife.com/2018_Sarah% 20Scaife%20Foundation_Annual%20 Report.pdf ............................................................ 5a ix Other Authorities Adolph Coors Foundation 2015 IRS Form 990, GuideStar (Jan. 21, 2020 4:30 PM), https://pdf.guidestar.org/PDF_Image s/2016/510/172/2016-510172279- 0d99d557-F.pdf .................................................... 4a 2018 Year in Review, The Lynde & Hary Bradley Foundation (Jan. 21, 2020 4:55 PM), https://cdn2.hubspot.net/ hubfs/4152914/2018_YearReview_Br adleyFdn.pdf ........................................................ 4a Charles Koch Foundation, 2018 IRS Form 990, BKD LLP (Jan. 21, 2020 4:50 PM) https://mk0bahufale3skgkthdo. kinstacdn.com/wp- content/uploads/2019/11/990-CKF- 2018.pdf................................................................ 4a Deep Dive Episode 23 – En Banc D. C. Circuit Upholds CFPB Constitutionality, THE REGULATORY TRANSPARENCY PROJECT (Feb. 5, 2018) ........................................ 17 Donors Trust (Jan. 21, 2020 4:30 PM), https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.p hp?title=DonorsTrust .......................................... 2a x Andrew Jackson, Veto Message Regarding the Bank of the United States (July 10, 1832), in A COMPILATION OF THE MESSAGES AND PAPERS OF THE PRESIDENTS, 1789-1897 (James D. Richardson ed., Washington Gov’t Printing Office 1896) ....................................................................... 8 Hon. Brett M. Kavanaugh, Panel: Federal Courts and Public Policy, American Enterprise Institute (Mar. 31, 2016) ..................................... 17 ASHLEY KIRZINGER ET AL., KAISER HEALTH TRACKING POLL – LATE APRIL 2017: THE
Recommended publications
  • Robert L. Tsai
    ROBERT L. TSAI Professor of Law American University The Washington College of Law 4300 Nebraska Avenue, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20016 202.274.4370 [email protected] roberttsai.com EDUCATION J.D. Yale Law School, 1997 The Yale Law Journal, Editor, Volume 106 Yale Law and Policy Review, Editor, Volume 12 Honorable Mention for Oral Argument, Harlan Fiske Stone Prize Finals, 1996 Morris Tyler Moot Court of Appeals, Board of Directors Allard K. Lowenstein International Human Rights Clinic B.A. University of California, Los Angeles, History & Political Science, magna cum laude, 1993 Phi Beta Kappa Highest Departmental Honors (conferred by thesis committee) Carey McWilliams Award for Best Honors Thesis: Building the City on the Hilltop: A Socio-Political Study of Early Christianity ACADEMIC APPOINTMENTS Temple University, Beasley School of Law Clifford Scott Green Chair and Visiting Professor of Constitutional Law, Fall 2019 Courses: Fourteenth Amendment History and Practice, Presidential Leadership Over Individual Rights American University, The Washington College of Law Professor of Law, May 2009—Present Associate Professor of Law (with tenure), June 2008—May 2009 Courses: Constitutional Law, Criminal Procedure, Jurisprudence, Presidential Leadership and Individual Rights, The First Amendment University of Georgia Law School Visiting Professor, Semester in Washington Program, Spring & Fall 2012 Course: The American Presidency and Individual Rights University of Oregon School of Law Associate Professor of Law (with tenure), 2007-08 Assistant Professor, 2002-07 2008 Lorry I. Lokey University Award for Faculty Excellence (via nomination & peer review) 2007 Orlando John Hollis Faculty Teaching Award Courses: Constitutional Law, Federal Courts, Free Speech, Equality, Religious Freedom, Civil Rights Litigation Yale University, Department of History Teaching Fellow, 1996, 1997 CLERKSHIPS The Honorable Hugh H.
    [Show full text]
  • The Conservative Pipeline to the Supreme Court
    The Conservative Pipeline to the Supreme Court April 17, 2017 By Jeffrey Toobin they once did. We have the tools now to do all the research. With the Federalist Society, Leonard Leo has reared a We know everything they’ve written. We know what they’ve generation of originalist élites. The selection of Neil Gorsuch is said. There are no surprises.” Gorsuch had committed no real just his latest achievement. gaffes, caused no blowups, and barely made any news— which was just how Leo had hoped the hearings would unfold. Leo has for many years been the executive vice-president of the Federalist Society, a nationwide organization of conservative lawyers, based in Washington. Leo served, in effect, as Trump’s subcontractor on the selection of Gorsuch, who was confirmed by a vote of 54–45, last week, after Republicans changed the Senate rules to forbid the use of filibusters. Leo’s role in the nomination capped a period of extraordinary influence for him and for the Federalist Society. During the Administration of George W. Bush, Leo also played a crucial part in the nominations of John Roberts and Samuel Alito. Now that Gorsuch has been confirmed, Leo is responsible, to a considerable extent, for a third of the Supreme Court. Leo, who is fifty-one, has neither held government office nor taught in a law school. He has written little and has given few speeches. He is not, technically speaking, even a lobbyist. Leo is, rather, a convener and a networker, and he has met and cultivated almost every important Republican lawyer in more than a generation.
    [Show full text]
  • Congressional Record—Senate S5011
    July 12, 2016 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — SENATE S5011 The clerk will report the bill by title. COMMENDING THE TENNESSEE experienced its warmest June on record The senior assistant legislative clerk VALLEY AUTHORITY ON THE ever. Already this year there have been read as follows: 80TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE UNI- eight weather-related and climate-re- A bill (S. 2650) to amend the Internal Rev- FIED DEVELOPMENT OF THE lated disasters that each caused at enue Code of 1986 to exclude from gross in- TENNESSEE RIVER SYSTEM least $1 billion in damage. Globally, it come any prizes or awards won in competi- Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, I ask was found that 2015 was the hottest tion in the Olympic Games or the year on record, and so far this year is Paralympic Games. unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the consideration of S. Res. on track to beat last year. We can’t There being no objection, the Senate 528, submitted earlier today. even hold the record for a year—2016 proceeded to consider the bill. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The has been as hot as Pokemon GO—and Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, I ask clerk will report the resolution by anyone watching the Senate floor to- unanimous consent that the bill be title. night who is younger than 31 has never read a third time and passed, the mo- The senior assistant legislative clerk experienced in their life a month where tion to reconsider be considered made read as follows: the temperature was below the 20th and laid upon the table, and that the century average.
    [Show full text]
  • Bibliography
    Bibliography Archival Insights into the Evolution of Economics (and Related Projects) Berlet, C. (2017). Hayek, Mises, and the Iron Rule of Unintended Consequences. In R. Leeson (Ed.), Hayek a Collaborative Biography Part IX: Te Divine Right of the ‘Free’ Market. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan. Farrant, A., & McPhail, E. (2017). Hayek, Tatcher, and the Muddle of the Middle. In R. Leeson (Ed.), Hayek: A Collaborative Biography Part IX the Divine Right of the Market. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan. Filip, B. (2018a). Hayek on Limited Democracy, Dictatorships and the ‘Free’ Market: An Interview in Argentina, 1977. In R. Leeson (Ed.), Hayek a Collaborative Biography Part XIII: ‘Fascism’ and Liberalism in the (Austrian) Classical Tradition. Basingstoke, England: Palgrave Macmillan. Filip, B. (2018b). Hayek and Popper on Piecemeal Engineering and Ordo- Liberalism. In R. Leeson (Ed.), Hayek a Collaborative Biography Part XIV: Orwell, Popper, Humboldt and Polanyi. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan. Friedman, M. F. (2017 [1991]). Say ‘No’ to Intolerance. In R. Leeson & C. Palm (Eds.), Milton Friedman on Freedom. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press. © Te Editor(s) (if applicable) and Te Author(s) 2019 609 R. Leeson, Hayek: A Collaborative Biography, Archival Insights into the Evolution of Economics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-78069-6 610 Bibliography Glasner, D. (2018). Hayek, Gold, Defation and Nihilism. In R. Leeson (Ed.), Hayek a Collaborative Biography Part XIII: ‘Fascism’ and Liberalism in the (Austrian) Classical Tradition. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan. Goldschmidt, N., & Hesse, J.-O. (2013). Eucken, Hayek, and the Road to Serfdom. In R. Leeson (Ed.), Hayek: A Collaborative Biography Part I Infuences, from Mises to Bartley.
    [Show full text]
  • Meet Charles Koch's Brain.Pdf
    “ Was I, perhaps, hallucinating? Or was I, in reality, nothing more than a con man, taking advantage of others?” —Robert LeFevre BY MARK known as “Rampart College”), School] is where I was first exposed which his backers wanted to turn in-depth to such thinkers as Mises AMES into the nation’s premier libertarian and Hayek.” indoctrination camp. Awkwardly for Koch, Freedom What makes Charles Koch tick? There are plenty of secondary School didn’t just teach radical Despite decades of building the sources placing Koch at LeFevre’s pro-property libertarianism, it also nation’s most impressive ideological Freedom School. Libertarian court published a series of Holocaust- and influence-peddling network, historian Brian Doherty—who has denial articles through its house from ideas-mills to think-tanks to spent most of his adult life on the magazine, Ramparts Journal. The policy-lobbying machines, the Koch Koch brothers’ payroll—described first of those articles was published brothers only really came to public LeFevre as “an anarchist figure in 1966, two years after Charles prominence in the past couple of who stole Charles Koch’s heart;” Koch joined Freedom School as years. Since then we’ve learned a Murray Rothbard, who co-founded executive, trustee and funder. lot about the billionaire siblings’ the Cato Institute with Charles “Evenifoneweretoaccept vast web of influence and power in Koch in 1977, wrote that Charles themostextremeand American politics and ideas. “had been converted as a youth to exaggeratedindictment Yet, for all that attention, there libertarianism by LeFevre.” ofHitlerandthenational are still big holes in our knowledge But perhaps the most credible socialistsfortheiractivities of the Kochs.
    [Show full text]
  • Senate Confirms Kirkland Alum to Claims Court - Law360
    9/24/2020 Senate Confirms Kirkland Alum To Claims Court - Law360 Portfolio Media. Inc. | 111 West 19th Street, 5th floor | New York, NY 10011 | www.law360.com Phone: +1 646 783 7100 | Fax: +1 646 783 7161 | [email protected] Senate Confirms Kirkland Alum To Claims Court By Julia Arciga Law360 (September 22, 2020, 2:46 PM EDT) -- A Maryland-based former Kirkland & Ellis LLP associate will become a judge of the Court of Federal Claims for a 15-year term, after the U.S. Senate on Tuesday confirmed him by a 66-27 vote. Edward H. Meyers is a partner at Stein Mitchell Beato & Missner LLP, litigating bid protests, breach of contract disputes and copyright infringement. While at the firm, he served as counsel for one of the collection agencies in a 2018 consolidated protest action challenging the U.S. Department of Education's solicitation for student loan debt collection services. He clerked with Federal Claims Judge Loren A. Smith between 2005 and 2006 before spending six years as a Kirkland associate, where he worked as a civil litigator handling securities, government contracts, construction, insurance and statutory claims. He earned his bachelor's degree from Vanderbilt University and his law degree summa cum laude from Catholic University of America's Columbus School of Law — where he joined the Federalist Society and still remains a member. Judiciary committee members Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., had raised questions about Meyers' Federalist Society affiliation before Tuesday's vote, and he confirmed that he did speak to fellow members throughout his nomination process.
    [Show full text]
  • Accelerated Attacks on Clean Energy by Koch Bros
    Checks and Balances Project Documents: Accelerated Attacks on Clean Energy by Koch Bros. $192 Million to 72 Groups Associated with Opposition to Clean Energy Solutions and Climate Change Denial from 1997-2013 $108 Million to At Least 19 Groups to Fight State Renewable Energy Policies 2011-2013 (Over 18 months, Checks and Balances Project conducted the first in-depth investigation into Koch Industries, Inc. AND what we call the Koch Advocacy Network. Over 350 low-profile regulatory disclosures and more than 8,000 legal disclosure forms drawn from over 60 public agencies, databases and courts were examined. Research was completed prior to the 2016 election.) In August 2015 President Obama singled out the “massive lobbying efforts backed by fossil fuel interests, or conservative think tanks, or the Koch brothers pushing for new laws to roll back renewable energy standards or prevent new clean energy businesses from succeeding.” The President described these anti-clean energy efforts as “rent seeking and trying to protect old ways of doing business and standing in the way of the future.”1 Charles Koch responded that, “We are not trying to prevent new clean energy businesses from succeeding” and warned against “subsidizing uneconomical forms of energy — whether you call them ‘green,’ ‘renewable’ or whatever.” He continued, “And there is a big debate on whether you have a real disease or something that’s not that serious. I recognize there is a big debate about that. But whatever it is, the cure is to do things in the marketplace, and to let individuals and companies innovate, to come up with alternatives that will deal with whatever the problem may be in an economical way so we don’t squander resources on uneconomic approaches.” 2 The defense outlined by Charles mirrors the strategy of the network he oversees.
    [Show full text]
  • Smith 1051.Pdf
    ISSN 1936-5349 (print) ISSN 1936-5357 (online) HARVARD JOHN M. OLIN CENTER FOR LAW, ECONOMICS, AND BUSINESS EQUITY AS META-LAW Henry E. Smith Forthcoming in Yale Law Journal Discussion Paper No. 1051 12/2020 Harvard Law School Cambridge, MA 02138 This paper can be downloaded without charge from: The Harvard John M. Olin Discussion Paper Series: http://www.law.harvard.edu/programs/olin_center The Social Science Research Network Electronic Paper Collection: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3734662 EQUITY AS META-LAW Henry E. Smith* October 15, 2020 (forthcoming, Yale Law Journal) * Fessenden Professor of Law, HArvArd Law School. EmAil: [email protected]. I would Also like to thAnk Leigh Anenson, Benito ArruñAdA, Lisa Austin, ShyAm BAlgAnesh, Sam Bray, Yun-chien Chang, Eric Claeys, Bob Ellickson, Yuval Feldman, Andrew Gold, John Goldberg, John Golden, Erik Hovenkamp, Bruce Johnsen, Louis Kaplow, Andrew Kull, MichAel Kenneally, Dan KlermAn, Dennis Klimchuk, Andrew Kull, Bentley MAcLeod, Paul Miller, SusAn Morse, EduArdo PeñAlver, Mark RAmseyer, Emily Sherwin, Ted Sichelman, Steve Spitz, JAmes Stern, Alex Stremitzer, And Audiences At the ItAliAn Society of LAw And Economics, University of BolzAno, ItAly; the Workshop on Entrepreneurship And the LAw, BrighAm Young University LAw School; the AmericAn LAw And Economics Annual Meeting, Columbia Law School; the Fourth AnnuAl TriAngle Law And Economics Conference, Duke LAw School; the Robert A. Levy Fellows Workshop in LAw & Liberty, George MAson University School of LAw; the University of GeorgiA
    [Show full text]
  • Congressional Record—Senate S6886
    S6886 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — SENATE October 31, 2017 that—exactly the opposite. She wrote EXECUTIVE SESSION preme court justices who were not ap- that if a judge’s personal views were to proved by Republican Senators to move impede that judge’s ability to impar- to the Federal bench: Lisabeth Tabor tially apply the law, then the judge EXECUTIVE CALENDAR Hughes from Kentucky, Myra Selby should recuse herself from the case. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under from Indiana, Don Beatty from South As the coauthor of that article and the previous order, the Senate will pro- Carolina, Louis Butler from Wisconsin, current president of Catholic Univer- ceed to executive session and resume Patricia Timmons-Goodson from North sity recently put it, ‘‘The case against consideration of the Barrett nomina- Carolina. Prof. Barrett is so flimsy, that you tion, which the clerk will report. Senate Republicans turned obstruc- have to wonder whether there isn’t The senior assistant legislative clerk tion of judicial nominees into an art some other, unspoken, cause for their read the nomination of Amy Coney form under President Obama. Yet Sen- objection.’’ Barrett, of Indiana, to be United States ator MCCONNELL, day after day, has It does make you wonder. Circuit Judge for the Seventh Circuit. said: ‘‘I think President Obama has To those using this matter as cover The PRESIDING OFFICER. The as- been treated very fairly by any objec- to oppose Professor Barrett because of sistant Democratic leader. tive standard.’’ her personally held religious beliefs, Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, Senator He comes to the floor now regularly let me remind you, there are no reli- MCCONNELL has come to the floor to to complain about ‘‘obstruction’’ of gious tests—none—for public office in complain about what he calls obstruc- Trump nominees.
    [Show full text]
  • Contempt of Courts? President Trump's
    CONTEMPT OF COURTS? PRESIDENT TRUMP’S TRANSFORMATION OF THE JUDICIARY Brendan Williams* Faced with a letter from the American Bar Association (ABA) assessing him as “arrogant, lazy, an ideologue, and lacking in knowledge of the day-to-day practice,” Lawrence VanDyke, nominated by President Trump to serve on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, cried during an October 2019 confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee.1 Republican senators dutifully attacked the ABA as liberally-biased.2 In a Wall Street Journal column, a defender of VanDyke assailed what he called a “smear campaign” and wrote that “[t]he ABA’s aggressive politicization is especially frustrating for someone like me, an active member of the ABA[.]”3 VanDyke was confirmed anyway.4 Contrary to Republican protestations, the ABA has deemed 97% of President Trump’s nominees to be “well qualified” or “qualified.”5 Indeed, in the most polarizing judicial nomination of the Trump Administration, Justice Brett Kavanaugh, Kavanaugh’s defenders pointed to the ABA having rated him “well qualified” despite the association having once, in 2006, dropped his rating to “qualified” due to concerns about his temperament.6 *Attorney Brendan Williams is the author of over 30 law review articles, predominantly on civil rights and health care issues. A former Washington Supreme Court judicial clerk, Brendan is a New Hampshire long-term care advocate. This article is dedicated to his father Wayne Williams, admitted to the Washington bar in 1970. 1Hannah Knowles, Trump Judicial Nominee Cries over Scathing Letter from the American Bar Association, WASH. POST (Oct. 30, 2015). 2Id.
    [Show full text]
  • Administration of Donald J. Trump, 2017 Remarks at the National Rifle Association Leadership Forum in Atlanta, Georgia April 28
    Administration of Donald J. Trump, 2017 Remarks at the National Rifle Association Leadership Forum in Atlanta, Georgia April 28, 2017 Thank you, Chris, for that kind introduction and for your tremendous work on behalf of our Second Amendment. Thank you very much. I want to also thank Wayne LaPierre for his unflinching leadership in the fight for freedom. Wayne, thank you very much. Great. I'd also like to congratulate Karen Handel on her incredible fight in Georgia Six. The election takes place on June 20. And by the way, on primaries, let's not have 11 Republicans running for the same position, okay? [Laughter] It's too nerve-shattering. She's totally for the NRA, and she's totally for the Second Amendment. So get out and vote. She's running against someone who's going to raise your taxes to the sky, destroy your health care, and he's for open borders—lots of crime—and he's not even able to vote in the district that he's running in. Other than that, I think he's doing a fantastic job, right? [Laughter] So get out and vote for Karen. Also, my friend—he's become a friend—because there's nobody that does it like Lee Greenwood. Wow. [Laughter] Lee's anthem is the perfect description of the renewed spirit sweeping across our country. And it really is, indeed, sweeping across our country. So, Lee, I know I speak for everyone in this arena when I say, we are all very proud indeed to be an American.
    [Show full text]
  • Jeff Shesol Author, Supreme Power: Franklin Roosevelt Vs
    Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States Written Testimony of Jeff Shesol Author, Supreme Power: Franklin Roosevelt vs. the Supreme Court August 27, 2021 DIAGNOSIS The Real Mischief In February 1937, when presenting his plan to pack the Supreme Court, Franklin Roosevelt offered a rationale: that the oldest justices had fallen behind in their work and fallen out of step with “modern complexities.” The first of these was demonstrably false; the second was only partly true. This misdirection, Roosevelt later conceded, was a mistake. “I did not place enough emphasis on the real mischief—the kinds of decisions which, as a studied and continued policy, had been coming down from the Supreme Court.” What, we might ask in a similar spirit, is the real mischief today? Or, put differently: what is the core problem this Commission should aim to address? A review of testimony to date reveals a range of concerns: an entrenched majority of ideologically driven, outcome-oriented conservative justices; among those justices, an inconstant relationship with the principle of stare decisis and a willful blindness to “the plainest facts of our national life,” as Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes once put it; the systematic incapacitation of government at both the state and federal level to address mounting crises; a shattering of the norms of the judicial appointments process by Senate Republicans. This, of course, is a partial list. A ranking of problems according to significance would surely put agenda-driven judicial activism at the top. The Supreme Court majority’s power—matched, it seems, by its eagerness—to vitiate certain civic institutions, to override hard-won understandings and overturn long-held doctrines, and to deny citizens the ability to do much of anything about it is a destructive sort of mischief.
    [Show full text]